Puppet is an open-source data center automation and configuration management framework aiming to provide system administrators a platform for consistent, transparent, and flexible systems management.

The necessity of data center automation and management tools (often grouped into the DevOps category) is becoming ever more apparent, as cloud principles and large-scale systems that process data in a parallel manner continue to emerge.

Case in point: Hadoop is an open-source platform powering hugely scalable search technology at companies such as Yahoo and also meeting the needs of companies that require heavy-lifting data analysis tasks across many verticals. Recently, Hadoop has been one of the cool kids of open source, with a broad range of companies interested in using the technology.

Cosmin Lehene, computer scientist at Adobe, noted that the company uses Puppet "to avoid the human factor." Lehene said Adobe uses Puppet to set up development environments in order to maintain consistency. Configuration tests are stored in order to determine work flow changes and ensure that all functions are repeatable.

This news provides more evidence that open source is ready for prime time. Adobe is a marquee example of an enterprise company that has embraced open source for a variety of purposes. According to Lehene, Adobe is glad to share its work on open-source projects to benefit community and company interests.

By making its own Puppet modules for managing Hadoop available to all for free, Adobe is tangibly demonstrating its commitment to Puppet and Hadoop open-source technologies. And it is proving that large public companies are beginning to see value in participating in an open-source community.